Thursday, November 26, 2015

CHRIS HEMSWORTH CAPTAINS “IN THE HEART OF THE SEA”

Chris
Hemsworth powers through a different adventure as he stars as whalingship Essex First Mate Owen Chase, in Warner Bros. Pictures'
“In the Heartof the Sea.”

Based
on Nathaniel Philbrick’s best-selling book about the dramatic true journey of
the Essex, which in the winter of 1820, was assaulted by something no one could
believe: a whale of mammoth size and will, and an

“I
loved the script from the start,” gushes Hemsworth. “‘In the Heart ofthe Sea’
is about heroism and people being tested beyond their limits in absolutely
every way. I was also captivated by the psychological thriller

aspect
of the whale turning the tables on them. There is something incredibly
mysterious about how this animal is portrayed—why the whale goes on the attack,
which was unlike anything the Essex crew had ever encountered. The hunter
becomes the hunted.”

The
Nantucket of the early 1800s was very prestigious due to the wealth of the
whale oil industry. And, in turn, there was one group of men on the island who
commanded the most respect: the whalers.

But
within the whaling community, there was a distinct caste system, based more on
blood than on water. Hemsworth's character, Owen Chase, was a skilled whaler
who had repeatedly delivered record amounts of oil to port. Nevertheless, not
having been born to a whaling family, he is passed over to captain the Essex.

Hemsworth
offers, “Chase is a working-class guy who has the skill set and qualifications
to be captain but not the birthright. Because he is not from a privileged
family and doesn’t have the right name or background, he is

pushed
aside for captain to be first mate to George Pollard, much to his frustration
and anger.”

“Chase
is heroic, noble and charismatic,” director Ron Howard says, “but he’s also
flawed. He is driven by a need to prove himself and is single-minded about it
to a fault. Chris is such a courageous actor who

conveys
every facet of the character, sometimes without a word. Through his performance,
we really come to know Chase at a profound level.”

In
closing, Hemsworth notes that filming “In the Heart of the Sea” has affected
him profoundly. “The before and after is what I find to be one of the most
compelling aspects—how the men who survive respond to what they’ve been
through,” he says. “All of them are far different at the end from who they were
starting out. Coming home, how do they look at themselves and at the world? How
do they look at whaling? Are they going to go back out there and do it again…?
Or perhaps they are going to think, ‘Maybe this is wrong. Maybe there’s a
lesson to be learned here.’”

*Opening
across the Philippines on Thursday, December 3 in theaters and IMAX®,
“In the Heart of the Sea” is distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures, a Warner
Bros. Entertainment Company.